


age and the divide

by jonphaedrus



Category: Tales of Xillia
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-21
Updated: 2013-10-21
Packaged: 2017-12-30 01:57:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1012666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jonphaedrus/pseuds/jonphaedrus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"How do you even get your hair like that?" Jude asked one evening when they were all taking turns bathing in a stream, Rowen calmly laying on a towel by the edge of the water about thirty feet away from them, hands folded on his chest, to all appearances napping—leaving them alone, since the girls had gone off to find some herbs for dinner.</p>
            </blockquote>





	age and the divide

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rethira](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rethira/gifts).



"How do you even get your hair like that?" Jude asked one evening when they were all taking turns bathing in a stream, Rowen calmly laying on a towel by the edge of the water about thirty feet away from them, hands folded on his chest, to all appearances napping—leaving them alone, since the girls had gone off to find some herbs for dinner.

Alvin paused, and lifted his head the up from the surface of the river, shaking the water loose from his hair. "Like what?" he asked after a moment, while Jude sat there on his towel in only his underwear, his clothes hanging on the line, combing his hair.

"Get it to stick up like it does," Jude gestured one handed, scowling as he got tangles out of his hair. Alvin paused and then started squeezing water out of his hair. "Mine is so coarse I'm lucky if I can get it to just…flatten, let alone do that fancy stuff." Alvin half-laughed and picked up his towel, scrubbing the rest of the water out of his hair.

It was warm enough that they could bathe without being freezing, and Alvin was enjoying the breeze, since he was all-but-naked himself (he was, however, glad that Rowen tended to go ahead of them and by the time they got there, was taking his afternoon sunbathing nap).

"I just…scrub it. And it does it." Alvin said, finally, drying the water off of his chest. He could feel Jude staring, and finally he snorted and shook his head.

"Don't take that for granted, Alvin." Jude pointed his comb accusingly in Alvin's direction. "I'm jealous."

"Yeah, but think about just what a pain it is that I can't get it to do anything else," Alvin grumbled, and Jude snorted.

"At least it isn't in your eyes." Alvin paused, and then walked over to his coat, enjoying the feeling of the grass between his toes (a true guilty pleasure, since he'd never experienced it as a child) and pulled a couple of hairpins out of his pocket.

He looked at them for a minute.

They had been his mother's. Before. His face twisted, and he stilled it, clenched his jaw for a moment, and then turned toward Jude, grinning, and held them up.

"Hairpins?"

The light in Jude's eyes was bright enough that he didn't feel bad letting them go.

 

\---

 

"Really," Alvin paused, his foot frozen to the ground.

He had been avoiding Fennmont just for the purpose of avoiding that voice, and after a moment he turned around. Jude was staring at him arms crossed, eyebrows raised. His hair, apparently, had given up being tamed and was wild and getting a bit too long, but there they were—

He was wearing Alvin's mother's hairclips.

"Really what, _Doctor?"_ Alvin said back, head tilted slightly, and Jude snorted, running fingers through his hair. "I heard you're the youngest Doctor ever turned out by the Talim Medical School."

"I'm not sure how true that is, but shut up." Alvin didn't mention that he'd heard from Yurgen who had heard from Gaius who had heard from Rowen who had heard from Elize who had heard from Driselle that Jude was likely up for the Howe Prize this year for his Spyrite research.

It was almost inconceivable to think that the year before Jude had still been a student.

"The beard, Alvin." Alvin paused, and reached his hand up to stroke his beard. He paused, and then pulled his eyebrows together.

"What about it?"

Jude shifted to one side, leaned his elbow on his hip, and put his chin on his fist. He raised his eyebrows, thinking. Alvin crossed his arms and waited for the Jude Decision.

He wasn't going to admit aloud that he liked how dashing it had made him look, and that he was hoping Jude would like it. It filled his face out well, he thought. Especially with his hair, and the new suit.

"It makes you look like a two bit villain."

It was like someone had punched him hard just under the ribcage. Alvin's throat got all tight and his jaw clenched and he swallowed. Jude was still looking at him with those bright golden eyes, guileless and innocent. Alvin couldn't breathe. He kept feeling tighter and colder. He wanted to run away.

"Does it?" Two decades of practice made his voice come out normal and Jude didn't even seem to notice. Alvin was very good.

"I mean…it definitely looks good on you, but it gives you this sort of…feral look? I mean, if you had crazy eyebrows, it would really look evil." Alvin managed a derisive snort. "Seriously. Don't start tying your hair up or I'd be really worried about you taking up a life of petty vice."

"Thanks, Jude." Jude smiled, and then said,

"No problem."

That night, Alvin went home and shaved his jaw clean, fingers shaking so hard he nearly nicked himself, and tried not to think about it.

 

\---

 

"You're lucky you kept your eye," Jude admonished, carefully plucking another piece of glass out of Alvin's skin, while on the other side of the office Leia and Elize attempted to make Gaius sit still, the man kept making angry noises as Leia held him down so that Elize could try and get the bar out of his leg. "This is very close." Alvin winced as Jude plucked another shard of metal free.

Another assassination attempt. This one had been very nearly successful—it probably would have been if Gaius hadn't actually _sliced the car coming at them in half._

Sometimes Alvin was really glad that he knew someone who was so stupidly obsessed with keeping up his sword skills.

As it was, though, Gaius had a two foot iron pole through his leg, a shrapnel burst had nearly blinded Alvin, Karla had a severe concussion, Yurgen had broken his leg in two places, Jude and Elize both had whiplash, and Rowen had nearly had a heart attack.

They were all lucky to survive, really.

The summit had been called off and they were trying to find the terrorists. No luck yet, though. 

Jude plucked another metal shard out of Alvin's eye and sighed as he picked up his cotton swab and started wiping down the injury with alcohol, ignoring Alvin's wincing.

Gaius kept grunting in pain as Elize and Leia worked on the iron bar. 

"You're being a big baby compared to him," Jude pointed out, and Alvin scowled. "No, don't do that, I can't get to it right. This is going to scar badly enough as it is already." Gaius shouted and Alvin settled. He could hear voices outside and Elize kept casting healing spells. His breathing was loud in his ears as Jude worked, carefully, slowly, his Spyrite pacing on the floor, Luna's tail whipping. "For Maxwell's sake, Alvin, hold still," Jude snapped, when Alvin tried to shift. "If you really want to look like you have tattoos all over your face, be my guest, but I could be helping Gaius instead of you."

The thought of tattoos reminded him clearly of one thing—

The marks that had burned themselves into Gilland's skin after Celcius had tethered to him.

Alvin stayed still the rest of the time.

 

\---

 

When his hair started shooting grey in his early forties, Alvin spent one entire morning locked in his bathroom trying to figure out what to do. Eventually, there was a knock on the door, and it opened slightly to reveal Jude standing there, looking worried.

"You know," he said, when Alvin kept staring at him, "It doesn't look bad. I'd say if anything it makes you look mature." Alvin looked back to the mirror, and murmured,

"I didn't before?"

"Not in this way." Jude walked forward, stopping next to the sink, and looked at him in the reflection. He had grown up significantly, and even as he got older (to Alvin's relief) he had never really started to look like his father. When his baby fat had worn off Jude's face shape was clearly Derrick's, but his mother's eyes and hair had never let the resemblance be over-clear.

When he wore glasses to read the resemblance was there more, but not even.

On the other hand, as Alvin had aged, he'd stopped seeing his mother in his face and started seeing the one person he never wanted to see. Especially now, with the faint scars from the shrapnel around his eye, and the silver filling his hair but the brown still hanging down he looked like—

Gilland.

Jude continued looking at him, and seemed to realise the same thing, because he set his hand on Alvin's arm. "It's not bad, Alfred. It looks good on you. And he wasn't—"

"Don't say it," Alvin whispered. He looked away.

Balan had always looked like their uncle. But Alvin hadn't looked like him until recently.

"What are you going to do?" Jude asked, quiet. Alvin scrubbed his fingers through his hair.

"Don't know. I'll figure something out."

Later that week, in Trigleph, when Jude wasn't around, Alvin went to a barber and had his hair chopped short for the first time since he was a child. It was strange, the back of his head felt cold, and when Jude saw him a few days later, he smiled sadly, but took Alvin's hand and squeezed it tight. He didn't need to say anything else.

Besides, Alvin thought he looked pretty good with a short, loose mop of hair. The grey made him feel dignified, even. And…well, if he had to admit it. It did kind of make him more mature.

And he was doing better than Gilland had. He'd gone grey before he'd ever even turned thirty. Not to mention, at least Alvin knew better than to keep dyeing two strands of his hair two ugly colours and calling it attractive. _Way_ better sense there.


End file.
